1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to an electron emitter, a method of manufacturing the electron emitter, and an electro-optical device and an electronic apparatus having the electron emitter.
2. Related Art
In the past, as electron emitters, there were known a thermal electron emission type and a cold-cathode electron emission type. As the electron emitters of the cold-cathode electron emission type, there were known a field emission type that electrons are emitted by an electric field and a surface conduction type that electrons are emitted from a conduction band of an electrode surface by allowing current to flow in the electrode.
As the electron emitter of the surface conduction type among them, there is known an electron emitter in which an electron emission portion is formed through an electrification forming process. Through the electrification forming process, a conductive thin film is destroyed locally to form a micro crack (narrow gap) destroyed locally. In this state, the electron emission portion is embodied by using the property that electrons with vacuum level are leaked from the micro crack when current is allowed to flow in the conductive thin film (for example, see JP A-9-213210).
The conductive thin film of the electron emitter according to Patent Document 1 is formed by the use of a so-called droplet jetting method (inkjet method). In this method, the conductive film is formed by applying a functional solution containing a conductive material in a pattern onto a substrate by the use of the droplet jetting method and then removing a solvent of the functional solution through the use of a dry process or the like.
According to this method, it is possible to relatively easily form the patterned conductive thin film, but it is difficult to control the film surface. That is, in the conductive thin film formed by the use of the droplet jetting method, the film surface can be easily disturbed after forming the conductive thin film and such a disturbance remarkably appears in the outer edge portions of the pattern. The electron emission characteristic of the electron emitter having such a conductive thin film is affected by the disturbance of the film surface of the conductive thin film, thereby causing deviation in characteristic within an element and between elements.